Check out my first week of training here:

• Sprint Tri + Half-Marathon Training: Week 1

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Another week of training done, another week of adjusting the plan done

(Click to see the actual google spreadsheet)

Monday – 45 minutes of Strength Training

My duck itch/swimmers itch was at it’s peak on Monday and I was SO ITCHY. Hot yoga was out of the question so I ended up staying home and doing a 45-minute upper body workout with Eric, he does this workout a couple times a week. It was tough and I was definitely sore for a couple of days afterwards!

• one arm bicep curl – 3 x 8 @ 15 lbs
• one arm bicep curl – 3 x 8 @ 10 lbs
• hammer curls – 3 x 8 @ 15 lbs
• barbell bicep curl – 3 x 8 @ 30 lbs
• tricep overhead extension with dumbbells – 3 x 8 @ 15 lbs
• tricep overhead extension with barbell – 3 x 8 @ 30 lbs
• tricep dips – 3 x 15 @ bodyweight
• bentover dumbbell row – 3 x 15 @ 25 lbs
• front raise – 3 x 8 @ 7 lbs
• lateral raise – 3 x 8 @ 7 lbs

Tuesday – 6.5 mile run and 750 metre swim

Ran 6.5 miles with my old neighbour in the morning. I was supposed to bike to work after that but the sky did not look good and I just did not feel like it so I packed up all my stuff for swimming after work.

I’ll never swim at the YMCA at 5:30 on a weekday again. There were tons of KIDS at the pool fooling around in the lanes. I did some sprints and it was nice to switch it up from just swimming easy.

750 m swim:

• 250 m – warmup
• 2 x 50 m – hard effort
• 1 x 100 m – hard effort
• 2 x 50 m – hard effort
• 200 m – cooldown

Wednesday – 4.75 mile bike ride, 3.75 mile tempo run

I biked 2 miles down to the track, did a 1.25 mile warmup, 2 miles at tempo or steady-state pace (this was hard!) and then 0.5 miles cooldown. I then biked back up the hill home. Let me tell you – biking after a hard run like that, especially uphill, was SO HARD. My legs felt like jelly. I definitely need to do more run-bike workouts in the future.

Also, my run coach (who has done all kinds of marathons, ironmans, ultra’s etc.) told me that he’s always had his best run times when he was doing biking for cross-training and that biking will make me a stronger runner. Good to know!

Thursday – 90 minute hatha hot yoga class

This was such a lovely class with one of my favourite instructors. She took the clock off the wall so nobody could check the time and she had this ticker-thingy that she turned on for some poses. For 6 different poses throughout the class we were supposed to close our eyes and focus on breathing in for 4 counts (of the ticker) and out for 6 counts.

This class was actually SO relaxing. I felt like I was on a bit of a yoga high when I was done because I was so zen and mellow. It wasn’t too hard of a class physically but it was AMAZING for my mental state!

Friday – 15 mile bike ride including first official bike crash

I finally biked to work! The weather has been so crappy here lately that I have not been biking to work nearly as much as I would like to be. On Friday I biked 4.5 miles to work and then tagged on some miles on the way home to make the trip 10.5 miles total (including going up the giant hill!)

I was so proud of myself for this ride that when I came cruising towards our front door I distracted myself by looking at my watch. Well, the next thing I knew I ran into our front step, couldn’t get my foot out of the cage in time and over onto my side I went with the bike crashing on top of me. I was so shook up and scared that I immediately started bawling. Eric came out and helped me in the house and brought my bike in. He then indulged my crying for about 2 minutes before telling me he didn’t cry that hard when he crashed his bike at 9-years-old.

OK Eric. Point taken.

I think I was more scared and shaken up then anything as I wasn’t hurt TOO bad, though I did sustain some war wounds:

Saturday – 10 mile bike ride

Despite my crash the day before I had another bike ride planned for Saturday. I hemmed and hawed and put off my workout until 11:00 AM when I finally just got on my bike and rode. Biking is my weakest of the three sports so I don’t really enjoy it but I know I have to do it. This was a nice rolling hills ride and dare I say by the time I was getting close to the end of the ride I was actually enjoying myself? Maybe this whole biking thing isn’t so bad after all.

Sunday – 8 mile run, 1,000 metre swim

I got myself out of bed when Eric left for work this morning and headed out on my run by 7:30 AM since I knew it would be hot. My knee was a little tight from my crash on Friday so I decided to do 9 and 1′s (9 minutes running, 1 minute walking). I still managed to maintain a 9:50 pace over 8 miles despite the walk breaks so I was happy with that. I took a GU at mile 4.

After my run I headed to the pool for a 1,000-metre easy swim. I warmed up with 250 metres of front crawl, did 50 m kick, 150 m pull and 50 m kick and then decided to do 500 metres straight through with no breaks. The first 250 metres I still pushed off the wall but the last 250 metres I wouldn’t let myself push off the wall or touch the bottom and just treaded water to turn around at each end. I’m a strong swimmer so physically this was fine but mentally it was hard to swim laps without taking breaks.

What I look like after swimming. In case you were wondering

Weekly Totals:

Biking – 29.75 miles

Running – 18.5 miles

Swimming – 1,750 metres

Yoga – 1 class (90 minutes)

Strength Training – 1 session (45 minutes upper body)

Thoughts on Week 2:

No rest day. Whoops! I think Thursday could be considered “active rest” as it was a very easygoing yoga class. I do know rest days are important though so I’m going to make sure I have one this week. Despite not taking a rest day I felt really good and strong this week and was not nearly as tired as I was after training last week. I think I slept better this week, fuelled better and overall just trained smarter.

Biking is by far my weakest sport which means I need to keep working at it; at least three bike rides per week, maybe four. I also would like to fit in one more yoga class OR one more strength training session per week for a total of 3 yoga and/or strength sessions a week.

Overall week 2 was great. I enjoyed training and I’m feeling strong. Onto week 3!

Questions of the day: Have you ever crashed your bike? How was your week training-wise?

So I know I got my lovely little road bike over a year ago but I seem to just now be getting into using it on a regular basis.

It all started with Bike to Work Week and has gone from there. I discovered that not only do I enjoy riding my bike for exercise, I also really enjoy using it to commute to work.

I went to commute to work on Tuesday morning and made it all of two blocks when my tire went completely flat. Lovely. That night I pumped up the tire so I could ride to work the next day and the next day it was completely flat yet again.

I knew that my bike needed a tune-up so this was a good opportunity to take it in. Don’t forget my bike was only $100, so at this point I started freaking out that it might not be worth it to fix up my cheap bike. While the bike was getting diagnosed and fixed at the bike shop yesterday I did some googlingand number crunching and seriously, seriously considering buying a new road bike with my savings.

By the way, become a fan of the blog on Facebook. I promise I don’t just put updated blog posts on there – I also ask for advice and stuff!

Carolina John was clearly speaking to the devil on one shoulder

I hemmed and I hawed and finally decided to see how my bike performed after the tune-up. I mean, I know my bike isn’t great, but for the amount I’m biking right now – and for training for my sprint triathlon – it works.

Not only did the bike shop fix up my tire for me he also moved my handlebars up which he said would be way more comfortable, re-taped my handlebars since the tape was coming off, loosened an axle which would make it easier to peddle and did all the other normal tune-up stuff.

I also bought a bike lock so I can start using my bike to commute the measly 1-mile to the grocery store or 2-miles to the yoga studio. I live in a very central location and there is no need for me to drive everywhere!

My bike was looking pretty good after the tune-up, so I’ve decided to keep it around for the summer. If I enjoy this triathlon thing as much as I think I’m going to, a new road bike is in my sights this fall/winter (hopefully one on sale!)

In the meantime, I really want to work on being more of a bike commuter. My goal is to bike TO work 3-4 times per week and bike home twice a week (I will take the bus up the hill the other two times).

And if I can successfully do this bike commuter thing more often my reward just might be a new road bike!!

Oh, and I guess now that I have a bike lock I should move my bike out of our tiny entryway, hey? I think Eric would like that

Are you a bike commuter? Would you ever want to be?

Thanks for all your super sweet comments yesterday. The rain poured down until around 5:00 PM (one hour before our engagement photos) and then it buggered off. We spent two hours shooting the photos in three different locations and had an absolute blast. I peeked at a few on the camera and they looked amazing so I can’t wait to see them!

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This day has already been super crazy but fun!

I got up this morning with Eric when he went to work so I could do a load of laundry and grocery shop. I had an interview at 9:00 AM for a freelance article I’m working on and once that was done I threw all my stuff in the car and hightailed it the 110 KM (69 miles) to Salmon Arm to meet my friend Jamie for a brick workout (we are both doing our first triathlon at the end of August!)

Just as I was leaving the house I realized my Garmin was dead because it had been knocked off the charger last night. Nooo! I had to improvise on the drive over there. They should really make Garmin car chargers.

I didn’t mind the drive (which took about 1:15) because it’s really pretty! I love the area I live in.

This girl was waiting at the gas station for me!

We parked at a gas station on the outskirts of town (and used their washroom several different times for changing) and then we headed off on our bikes. The route we did was great, a few little hills but mostly flat.

The hour FLEW BY. I’ll be honest, I’m not a huge fan of cycling. But having a friend to ride with makes all the difference. It’s so much easier to carry on a conversation when you’re with a friend – and more fun too! Road look familiar? It’s the same one Jamie and I biked on last fall!

One hour and 14 miles later we were back at the gas station. We used their bathroom to change into running clothes and then headed out for a quick, and flat, 2.5 mile run.

1.5 hours later, my first brick workout ever was complete!

Originally, Jamie and I were going to do the try-a-tri distance in August. But now we’re thinking we will do the sprint triathlon. We basically did the bike and run legs today (20 km bike and 5 km run) so just tack a 750-metre swim on at the beginning and we’re golden! We have until August 1 before the price increases so we’re going to keep going with our training and decide then.

We were famished after our workout so we headed to the local pub (same place we went last time as well) and had some amazing veggie burgers! I had the portabella mushroom burger and Jamie had the quinoa-veggie burger. Omg, amazing!

I said bye to Jamie and headed on my way home then. I stopped in a small town about halfway between Salmon Arm and Kamloops to meet my friend Katie for coffee! I hadn’t seen her in forever so it was nice to catch up!

A full 7 hours after I left the house this morning I walked in the door – exhausted but feeling happy and satisfied. Crappy week begone!

How was your Saturday? Any triathletes out there who have some tips for me and Jamie while we train for our very first triathlon!?